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AFRICAN COLOiNlZATION. 



AN ADDRESS 



DELIVEKKD I'.Y 



JOHN II. B. LATROBE, 

President of the America^ CSolpiiizationi Scpijay,r,'^ *,'>^ \\ 



ANNIVERSARY MEETING OF THE MASSACHUSETTS 

COLONIZATION SOCIETY HELD IN THE 

MUSIC HALL, BOSTON, 




BALTIMOE-E: 
PRINTED BY JOHN D. TOY 

1853. 



Ucnrvv^ /d(r}0'J^>\.t^ />7-vi! 



,L 3 5-^ 



"Sir, I believe that Africa will be civilized, and civilized 

by the descendants of those who were torn from the land. I 

; beliqvQ it Jagcause I will not think that this great fertile con- 

.■firie]:rt;iii\lK)rberforevQT;; ieft vraste. I believe it because I see 

^ _ no other agency fully competent to the work. I believe it 

, ' jbec^Jisd jL* «$e .in this ^goJib^ a most v/onderful adaptation." 



EDWAiU) EviBETT, ISUi Jan'y, 1853. 



1^ 



0^ 



A D D Px. E S S 



MR. PRESIDENT: 

I AM here, at this time, to advocate the 
cause of African Colonization. 

Colonization, using the term in its general sense, 
has been the means through Avhich the earth, from a 
single pair, has become filled with its inhabitants. 
Prosecuted for the purposes of conquest, it made 
Cortez lord of the valley of Mexic^o, and placed 
Pizarro on the throne of the Incas. Resorted to as 
an alternative to oppression, its power has been 
demonstrated in the growth of this great Republic. 
Used for the transfer of a portion of a nation from 
one part of its territory to another, it finds an illus- 
tration at San Francisco, unparalleled in the history 
of mankind. 



AFRICAN 

Nor is there in African Colonization anything to 
distinguish it from the colonizations that have pre- 
ceded it, except in the circumstance to which it owes 
its distinctive epithet. It belongs to the class that is 
influenced rather by repulsion from one land, than by 
attraction, in the first instance, to another. Its repre- 
sentatives are the Pilgrims of Plymouth, rather than 
the founders of Vera Cruz. 

There are, in the United States, two races, the 
white and the colored. Brouofht from Africa, orijTi- 
nally, as slaves, the progenitors of the last have trans- 
mitted, even to the free of their decsendants, the 
memories and the associations of servitude, which 
cannot be shaken off while a portion of the same 
people, still in bondage, suggests, everlastingly, the 
history and the degradation of the past. Before 
Emancipation commenced, the relations of the races, 
as a matter of feeling, were probably of rare discus- 
sion. When the first ship-load of slaves was landed, 
imder colonial rule, in the Chesapeake, the wisest of 
the Virginia "adventurers" never dreamed that a day 
would come, when the descendants of the captives 
would be the alumni of colleges, distinguished mem- 
bers of the liberal professions, and filling, because fit 
to fill, political offices of the highest civilization. 
Generations were born and died, before such imao-jn- 



COLONIZATION. 



ings were entertained. But, as masters occasionally 
liberated their slaves, a class of freed-men was cre- 
ated, which, increasing from year to year, gradually 
attracted public attention ; and the far-seeing among 
the statesmen of the day began to consider the proba- 
bilities of the future in regard to it, with an interest 
to which subsequent events have shown that it was 
fully entitled. 

Amalgamation by intermarriage, as a remedy for 
the anticipated evils of the increase, was never for a 
moment thought of; and as the experience of all his- 
tory had shown that two races, which could not so 
amalgamate, could exist in the same land in no other 
relations than those of master and slave, or, where 
both were nominally free, of the oppressor and the 
oppressed, the idea of separation naturally became 
prominent, — a separation so wide as to preclude the 
fear, or chance even, of any subsequent collision. 
Hence the plan of colonizing the free people of color 
of the United States ; and hence the selection of the 
locality, — suggested, doubtless, by the origin of the 
emigrants, — which has given to this particular colo- 
nization its epithet of ''African." Under the in- 
fluence, at first, of such a repulsion as filled the May- 
flower; under the influence, hereafter, of such an 
attraction as filled the caravels of Corlez ; under both 



AFRICAN 

influences, indeed, now and hereafter, according to 
the temperament of the individual colonists, this colo- 
nization is to go forward unto .the accomplishment of 
the end. 

On the 28th of December, 1816, the first meeting 
to form the present Society was held in Washington. 
The speakers were Henry Clay, Elias B. Caldwell, 
John Randolph of Roanoke, and Robert Wright of 
Maryland. With the exception of a suggestion of 
Mr. Randolph, that the condition of the slaves would 
be improved by removing the free colored people, the 
views expressed were confined exclusively to the best 
interests of the latter, and the advantages that would 
result collaterally to Africa from the prosecution of the 
scheme; and the object of the Society was declared 
to be, " to promote and execute a plan for colonizing, 
with their own consent, the free people of color of the 
United States in Africa, or such other place as Con- 
gress might deem most expedient;" — the definition 
carefully excluding the idea of compulsory action on 
the part of the Society, as well as the idea of any 
interference with slavery. 

Thirty-seven years have passed since the meeting 
here referred to. The voices of the speakers can be 
heard no more. His, — the great orator's, the strong- 
willed statesman's, which swayed the hearts of men 



COLONIZATION. 

to and fro, as doth the wind the yielding corn, — has 
so recently been hushed, that its echoes hardly yet 
have ceased to vibrate around us. Thirty-seven years 
have passed, and the quiet scheme of philanthropy of 
1816 has become a great political necessity, still per- 
fect in its plan, still adapted to every emergency, and 
presenting the only solution to a problem that has, 
more than once, threatened our existence as an united 
people. 

The importance that in later years has been ac- 
quired by colonization, was hardly anticipated when 
the Society was formed. It is due, almost wholly, to 
the changes that have since taken place in the rela- 
tions of the white and the free colored population. 

In 1816, the feeling between the two was that of 
kindness. There was then no difficulty in obtaining 
employment, to create unfriendly competition. Cer- 
tain occupations seemed to be conceded by prescrip- 
tion to the colored man. If preferences were given, 
he obtained them. Associations protecting his free- 
dom existed, even in the slave-holding States. Eman- 
cipations were constantly taking place around him. 
And, if at any time disposed to complain of the infe- 
riority of his social position, he recognized, neverthe- 
less, the force of the circumstances to wdiich it was 
owing, and left its amelioration to time and events. 



A 5' HI C A N 

The long wars of Europe, just ended, had kept the 
emigrating classes at home, that they might be used 
there for manuring old lands with their blood, rather 
than be sent to people new ones with their enterprise; 
and, in 1820, the total number of immigrants and their 
descendants in the United States was but 359,000, 
and the annual immigration did not exceed 12,000 
persons frqm all countries. Our foreign element, 
therefore, which has always been the most hostile to 
the free colored population, was scarcely felt. The 
condition of things, then, in 1816, was most favorable 
to the free colored man, — nor, to the mass of the com- 
munity, was there any probability of a change. 

But how great, nevertheless, the change that has, 
in point of fact, taken place in the interval! All the 
kindly relations, which so many then supposed would 
last forever, have been broken up, beyond the power 
of reparation. Instead of moving along harmoniously 
in the avenues of labor, the whites and the free 
colored people now meet there only with ill-feeling 
and bad blood: and into these avenues, to increase 
the strife for bread and add to the confusion, there 
throngs an annual immigration, which, in thirty-three 
years, has multiplied from twelve thousand to five 
hundred thousand, making the whole number of immi- 
grants and their descendants, now in our country. 



COLONIZATION. 

upwards of five millions of souls. Jealousy and sus- 
picion characterize to-day the relations of the parties. 
Political influences are beginning to operate. Legis- 
lation is invoked; and State after State, slaveholding 
as well as non-slaveholding, is passing, or threaten- 
ing to pass, laws hostile to the continued residence 
amongst us of the free colored population. It is this 
state of things, no longer the dimly-shadowed possi- 
bility, to men of fearful minds, of 1816, but a palpable 
and ominous fact, that gives to colonization, as the 
only means yet devised for obviating an impending 
calamity, the character that is claimed for it, of a 
great national and political interest. 

The causes of the change here described are inti- 
mately connected with the proper consideration of the 
subject: they are manifest, and they are uncontrollable. 

The first, strangely enough it may be thought, is 
the gradual improvement of the free colored people, 
in education and refinement, which has been going on 
since 1816, and which, at first sight, would seem to 
furnish a reason why they should be permitted to re- 
main undisturbed amongst us, with a gradual amelio- 
ration of their social position. This, however, is the 
superficial view of the subject. 

The slave is callous, because he is ignorant, or 
because, without scope for aspiration, contentment 



AFRICAN 

becomes an incident of his condition. But make a 
freed-raan of him ; educate him ; enable him to see 
the rewards of ambition, only to discover that they 
are beyond his reach, — to appreciate social and politi- 
cal rank, only to learn that it is unattainable ; and he 
becomes sensitive and restless, just in proportion as 
he is capable and enlightened. A strife begins within 
him, that manifests itself in all his actions. He com- 
plains to those who will listen to him. He finds sym- 
pathizers, naturally enough, among the whites. He is 
looked upon as one who has "a cause." His friends 
fancy they have " a mission." Spirit chafes against 
spirit. Excitement is produced. Organization takes 
place. The sphere of action dilates. Soon it era- 
braces the question of slavery. The rarely gifted 
individual, the cause of the particular effervescence, is 
assumed as a fair representative of the entire race; 
and a crusade commences, which ultimately involves 
the whole country, and makes the free colored people 
the subjects of a family feud, as North and South 
array themselves in bitter antagonism. Nor is the 
reference to domestic affairs, thus suggested, inappli- 
cable. On the contrary, as he who is the subject of 
a household quarrel always finds himself obliged to 
leave the family, that peace may be restored between 
its members, so the contest, that has been waging 

10 ' 



COLONIZATION. 



among the whites in regard to the free colored people, 
threatens to end in the abandonment, by the latter, of 
the scene of the agitation, that, in a distant land, they 
may find a new home and w^ork out a different destiny. 
Had they remained as slaves in feeling, had education 
wrought in them no miracles, had refinement brought 
no sensitiveness, this state of things would never have 
existed as one cause of the change in question. 

The other of the causes is the foreign immigration. 
Its effect is two-fold. It operates to increase the irri- 
tability on the part of the better classes of the free 
colored people; and it is felt inconveniently, not only 
by those of them whose care does not extend beyond 
to-day, but by those also of the whites who meet the 
others in active competition for employment; a com- 
petition which was far from existing while the foreign 
immigration remained comparatively inconsiderable. 
Thanks to the vast country, yet to be filled with 
population, between the Atlantic and the Pacific, the 
demand for labor in the West, and the rapidly in- 
creasing facilities for transporting it from place to 
place, this crowding immigration disappears from the 
seaboard as fast as it arrives, so that the pressure 
created by it is not intolerable. But still, the immi- 
gration is not diminishing. Population is becoming 
denser and denser every day ; and as a cause for the 



AFRICAN 

change we are accounting for, the increase of foreign 
labor amongst us must continue to operate unto the 
end. 

That the explanation thus given is the true one, 
there can be but little doubt. Indeed, none other has 
been suggested during the angry controversy which 
for years past has shaken the fabric of our govern- 
ment, rousing all men from their indifference, and 
obliging them to look the future fully in the face. 

The question, then, arises, as to the proper remedy. 
The answer is plain. Either the white man's preju- 
dices must be overcome, that the colored man's sensi- 
tiveness maybe conciliated; or the immigration that 
brings the two races into collision must be stayed; or 
the weaker must escape from the influences that will 
make this collision intolerable. The mere statement 
of these alternatives indicates the inevitable choice. 

Twenty years have been consumed by zealous white 
men, aided by unquestionable instances of high intel- 
lectual cultivation and social refinement among the 
free people of color, in trying to place the latter upon 
a footing of social equality with the whites ; and ad- 
mitting, though the fact is not stated as of the speaker's 
knowledge, that, in rare cases and in particular neigh- 
borhoods, this may have been accomplished, yet it 
must be conceded that, as a general thing, the experi- 

12' 



COLONIZATION. 



ment, undertaken in perfect good faith, and vigorously 
prosecuted, has been an utter failure. To this point, 
let the free people of color speak for themselves. At 
a convention held in Baltimore, as late as 1852, of 
delegates from various parts of Maryland, and whose 
proceedings were conducted with propriety and dig- 
nity, the following resolutions were passed: — 

^^Mesolved, That while we appreciate and acknow- 
ledge the sincerity of the motives and the activity of 
the zeal of those who, during an agitation of twenty 
years, have honestly struggled to place us on a foot- 
ing of social and political equality with the white 
population of the country, yet we cannot conceal from 
ourselves the fact, that no advancement has been made 
towards the result, to us so desirable; but that, on 
the contrary, our condition as a class is less desira- 
ble now than it was twenty years ago. 

^^Resolved, That, in the face of an immigration 
from Europe, which is greater each year than it was 
the year preceding, and during the prevalence of a 
feeling in regard to us which the very agitation in- 
tended for our good, has only served, apparently, to 
embitter, we cannot promise ourselves that the future 
wull do that which the past has failed to accom- 
plish." 

^ 13 



AFRICAN 



Further proof would be surplusage, in regard to 
this part of the argument. 

But, perhaps, the stream of European immigration 
may be stayed. If it could, it would, at best, but 
leave things in their present position, sure to grow 
worse with the natural increase of our existing popu- 
lation. But, who dreams of staying it? It lands, 
and we lose sight of it. It is the leaven which is 
absorbed in the loaf it quickens. We are reminded 
of its presence, only when we hear its axe in the 
forest; its pick and spade along the great highways 
its labor builds for us; its shout, as, from the summit 
of the Rocky Mountains, in its westward progress, it 
looks down upon the slopes of the Pacific. We could 
not stay it, if we would. It is part and parcel of the 
great system, of which the colonization we are dis- 
cussing is another part. It moves forward in the well- 
ordered array of events, known by us as Progress. It 
assumed its place therein at the right time; and to 
interfere with its operation is as much beyond man's 
power, as it is for the fly on the wheel of the chariot 
to check the rapidity of its whirl. This immigration 
was delayed until a refuge had been prepared for 
those whose places it was to fill as they disappeared 
before it; and it is now, only now, when Africa is 
ready to receive the free colored people of the United 



14 



COLONIZATION. 

States, that Ireland and Germany seem disposed to 
empty themselves upon America. 

The first and second of the alternatives suggested, 
then, being out of the question, there remains the last 
only to be taken ; and separation, or colonization, 
becomes inevitable. 

There are many doubtless, however, who, admitting 
the force of the argument that has been attempted, 
look at what has been accomplished in Liberia and 
the United States since 1816, and then turning to the 
hundreds of thousands still remaining and still in- 
creasing in our midst, regret, in honest despair, the 
strength of the conclusion which leaves no other 
resource than one, that, in thirty-seven years, has, 
they fear, only demonstrated its own incapacity. 

But what are the facts in this respect? If the 
process of transplanting a people from one continent 
to another, is to be compared to that of transplanting 
an apple-tree from a hill side to a meadow, then cer- 
tainly nothing has been done. But, compare coloni- 
zation with colonization, and it will be found, that 
more has already been wrought by African Coloniza- 
tion, than has been accomplished by any preceding 
colonization, in the same time, since the world began. 
African Colonization is to be, as American Coloniza- 
tion was, the work of generations upon generations : 

15 



AFRICAN 

and no one is known who complains that the latter 
was two slow, or who finds fault with its results. 
Yet, in its commencement, it was a series of misfor- 
tunes ; while African Colonization has, up to this 
time, been a series of astonishing successes. War 
and Famine characterized the early history of the 
first, — Peace and Plenty the infancy of the last. After 
a colonial existence of an hundred and fifty years had 
closed with a seven year's war, the United States 
obtained their independence as a reward of victory on 
many a stricken field. At the end of thirty-four years 
from its first settlement, Liberia received indepen- 
dence and nationality as a free gift due to the ability 
and worth of the recipients. Comparing, then, the 
two colonizations by their results, at the end of simi- 
lar periods, that of Africa is, unquestionably, not the 
loser. And why should not the results of the future 
be equally favorable? 

Commerce is the great agent upon which all colo- 
nization must ultimately depend. How stands it with 
reference to that which is under consideration ? Let 
us push the comparison we have been making into 
details. 

Li the seventeenth century, the commerce of the 
world was feeble. Now it is in a state of intense 
activity. Then, the Goede Vrow of Knickerbocker 

Te 



COLONIZATION. 



was very nearly the model of its ships, to which the 
laboring winds toiled uselessly to impart velocity. 
Now, steam drives arrows through the waves. The 
Mayflower was sixty-five days in coming from Eng- 
land to America. Thirty days is now the average 
passage of sailing vessels from the Chesapeake to 
Africa. 

Emigration is one of the collaterals of commerce, 
not its principal object. It reacts to promote its 
activity, it is true; but commerce, whose great agency 
is to effect exchanges, furnishes transportation, as a 
general rule, incidentally only. There was scant 
occasion for its legitimate functions in the infancy of 
the Thirteen Colonies. The colonists themselves were 
the principal consumers of foreign importations. The 
Indian wanted bat little, and, except in furs, had 
little to give in exchange for what he did want: nor, 
in truth, had the old world much to spare for him. 
Manufactures were in their infancy; steam was un- 
born ; and men who tilled their fields with their guns 
within their grasp, and hurried with them in their 
hands from the house of God, to use them in self- 
defence against a relentless enemy, were not such cus- 
tomers as trade was wont to thrive upon, even at the 
distant day to which we are referring. Very differ- 
ent, indeed, are the present relations of commerce 



17 



AFRICAN 



with Africa, to what they were in the seventeenth 
century with America. Instead of a population, scant 
and sparse, of hunters, having few wants for civiliza- 
tion to supply, the population of Africa is one of 
teeming millions, athirst for everything that civiliza- 
tion can produce, from the richest fabrics of the loom 
to the humblest fabrics of the lapstone. If, for up- 
wards of two hundred years, the slave trade has been 
giving sharpness to the edge of African appetite for 
guns and powder, rum and tobacco, it has, at the 
same time, produced commercial relations which will 
eventually be the all-powerful agents of African Colo- 
nization. Throughout all Nigritia, — throughout all 
Ethiopia, — from the Kong Mountains to the Mediter- 
ranean, — from the Kong Mountains to the Cape of 
Good Hope, — from Cape Verde to Cape Guardafui, 
there are vast markets, which have become the neces- 
sities of manufacturing civilization, whose over-pro- 
duction, in its search for outlets, has given that ac- 
tivity to commerce which is one of the most striking 
features of the age we live in. These markets are to 
be reached, that they may be supplied. This, the 

TASK OF COMMERCE, IS TO BE THE GUARANTY OF 
COLONIZATION. 

Nor is the African himself without his manufactures. 
He makes, in many places, an iron, which is superior 



IS 



COLONIZATION. 



to the imported article; out of which he fabricates 
weapons, and often armor. The chains and rings of 
gold of the Mandingoes are of rare excellence. In 
leather, the native is a skillful workman; and his 
loom, of the simplest fashion, supplies him with a cot- 
ton cloth, strong and serviceable, and frequently dyed 
with a taste that would do credit to an artist's skill. 
That slaves have been the articles of trade heretofore 
I obtained from him, is a consequence of the white 
i man's teachin?. But the time has come for a wiser 
\ instruction ; and wherever colonization plants a settle- 
I ment, gold and ivory and rich dye-woods, hides and 
I wax, gums and spices, rice and palm oil, exclude from 
I the market the fellow-beings of the merchant. 
I While, therefore, in the case of America, coloniza- 

1 tionwas the principal, and commerce the accessory, — 

< 

\ in the case of Africa, it is just the reverse; and in- 

5 stead of having a commerce to build up, coloni- 
' zation takes advantage of one that has existed for 
j generations, and is now increasing with a rapidity 
that is due to the extent of the market to be sup- 
plied by it. 

But, there is one of the relations between commerce 
and African Colonization that is peculiar, and the 
importance of which, in every point of view, can 
scarcely be over-estimated. The markets extending 



AFRICAN 

from the Gambia coastwise to the Zaire, and to the 
interior across the mountains that form the southern 
boundary of the valley of the Niger, and across the 
river and the valley to its northern confines, can be 
reached in no way so well as through the portal of 
Liberia. The English have in vain tried to penetrate 
them by expeditions up the Niger, and from their 
establishments on the coast. But they are beyond the 
white man's reach, except through the factors sup- 
plied by the colored population of the United States. 
Intelligent, educated, experienced, with peculiar fit- 
ness for trade, and exempted, constitutionally, from 
those diseases of the climate which protect the Libe- 
rians from the encroachments of the people they have 
left, the colonists from this country may, in their 
especial adaptation to the functions they are called 
upon to fill, find another reason to acknowledge the 
hand of Providence in the series of events, which, 
commencing with the slavery of their ancestors, ends 
in the return of their descendants to the continent 
from whence they came, after a probation, which, like 
that of Israel of old, seems to have been necessary to 
fit them to become the agents of African Civilization. 
America was open to the colonists or the 
WORLD. There is but one people that can 
colonize Western Africa and live. 

26" 



COLONIZATION. 



And how compare the motives respectively of 
American and African Colonization? For this is a 
feature in the inquiry which should not be lost sight 
of. Where the Englishman had one motive to leave 
his home for America, even in the most adverse times, 
the free colored resident in the United States has 
many. There was nothing in English law, nothing 
in English prejudice, to prevent the Carvers, the 
Robinsons, the Winthrops, and Winslows, from being 
Lord High Chancellors of the realm. There is noth- 
ing now, in law or prejudice, in Great Britain, to 
prevent the poorest Irishman from aspiring to, and 
winning, the highest political distinction. But what 
can the other hope to obtain by remaining in America? 
An unharmed respectability in insignificance, — pro- 
tection for such property as an active competition will 
permit him to acquire, — here and there a right to vote, 
as an incident to his possessions of land or money, — 
and even all this enjoyed under a constant apprehen- 
sion of measures hostile to his peace, comfort and 
dignity. This is said in no spirit of unkindness. It is 
said as a prominent truth, due to the fair discussion 
of the subject. African Colonization is built upon a 
conviction of the absolute capacity of the colored race, 
when relieved from the pressure of circumstances, for 
the highest intellectual development; and the real 



AFRICAN 

friends of the race ought rather to promote its removal 
to a home where this development can take place at 
once, than by retaining it where this is impossible, 
perpetuate its inferiority. Words of counsel, it is 
admitted, are of small avail, where the native soil is to 
be abandoned, and the hearth-stone left desolate ; and 
yet we would say to the intelhgent and educated 
among the free people of color, that, although in the 
land they leave, they have wielded no power, built up 
no monuments, it may be wise to take to heart the 
story and imitate the example of the Moor, and seek 
another Grenada, where the Aragonese and the Cas- 
tilian, who have refused to treat them as equals, can 
no longer overshadow them with their greatness. 

But the counsel thus given, would not now be 
proper in every instance. Colonization, which has 
provided a City of Refuge, when circumstances will 
compel removal, leaves it to every one to determine 
for himself the day and the hour of his emigration. 
It is not every one who is fit to be a colonist. Those 
who are fit, may be detained in this country by para- 
mount considerations of duty. The great mass will 
remain while they suffer no physical inconvenience. 
And it is better that it should be so.. Many now 
living may hand down the question of removal to 
their grand-children and great-grand-children ; and 



COLONIZATION. 



even these may hesitate. If it is so, it will be because 
it is a part of the scheme that it should be so. To 
the adventurous, the able and the ambitious only, the 
men who seek to carve their names on the founda- 
tion-stones of empires, may emigration be counseled 
without responsibility. But to all it may be said, 
African Colonization, sooner or later, is Des- 
tiny. The call to strike the tent and fill the knap- 
sack will sound in each man's heart; — and when his 
inward being thrills with it, let him march on his 
way, and join the army with banners, the cross in the 
van, — the Exodus of Africa, — that shall then be on 
its journey eastward across the sea. 

The motive to emigrate existing, then, as powerfully 
as has been suggested, and commerce being relied 
upon to afford the means of transportation, but one 
question remains, which is, the efficiency of commerce 
for the purpose. It has been already stated, that the 
foreign immigration of 1852 amounted to five hundred 
thousand; and there is every reason to believe that, 
during the present year, even this large number will 
be exceeded. Every one of these immigrants comes 
at his own cost, or with means remitted by friends who 
have already established themselves in America; and 
he comes from a class which is far less able to pay its 
expenses on the voyage than the corresponding class 

"23"" 



AFRICAN 

of free colored men in the United States, very few of 
whom could not collect, among white friends, upon 
the instant, money to pay their passage; while the 
Irishman and German have, in ninety-nine cases out 
of the hundred, to rely upon themselves exclusively. 
Now, the entire free colored population of our country 
is but 428,661,* or less than a year's work for the 
shipping employed in 1852 in bringing immigrants 
across the Atlantic. Indeed, had the entire colored 
population, slave and free, been ready for removal, 
the 3,633,750 composing it would have afforded less 
than seven years' work to the same vessels. It is 
most true that years must elapse before the increase 
of this population, even, is visibly affected; but the 
statistics here given show the efficiency of commerce, 
as the agent that is to produce the result; and the 
only question left open is the question of time. 

The conclusion, then, which, it is thought, may be 
fairly drawn, is, that the separation of the free colored 
race from the whites of this country is inevitable, and 
essential to the happiness of both parties; that it will 
be brought about gradually, by the operation of causes 
that cannot be controlled; that it will proceed silently, 
producing no more sensation than is produced by em- 
igration to California, "oozing," to use the most 

* The numbers of the census of 1850 are used here. 



COLONIZATION. 

expressive term of the Chinese, when speaking of the \ 

disappearance of silver, from amongst us, to be quietly \ 

and usefully absorbed in Liberia ; involving here no ; 

rude partings ; leaving no voids, the means of fdling | 

which are not at hand; the emigrants, in the end, ; 

paying their own expenses, and going forth cheerfully \ 

and hopefully^ with confident assurance of a happy ; 

and honorable home. This will be the glorious frui- < 

tion of the great plan of African colonization, which '< 

will then have fulfilled all the exifrencies of a political > 

necessity, under the holy influences of the pure phi- ; 

lanthropy and wise forethought in which it originated. | 

The Society which now has charge of this work, ] 
while emigration, in its feebleness, still requires pecu- 

I niary aid, will then exist, in all probability, rather to \ 

perpetuate its associations, than to facilitate a process j 

which will long since have become independent of j 

assistance. Or, perhaps, its organization, even, hav- | 
i ing fallen into desuetude, it may occupy no other place 

than as a portion of that vast temple, whose materials | 
I are the good deeds of men. Be this, however, as it 
i may; whether the existence of the American Coloni- 
! zation Society shall then be practical or historical, an 
I empire will acknowledge it as its founder. It will be 
> spoken of in terms of gratitude, as the exterminator 
of the slaVe-trade. The missionary to nations whose 



COLONIZATION. 



names even have not yet reached the ears of civilization 
shall fashion uncouth languages to define and describe 
it. The lessons of the Sunday School, taught beneath 
the palm trees, which then will cast their shadows on 
a Christian land, shall make infancy lisp its story. 
Cities will perpetuate, in their names, the memories 
of those who have been prominent in its cause ; and, 
from Senegambia to the Niger, the voice of grateful 
millions shall shout the chorus of its praise. 



26 



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